Box Score

WINONA, Minn. - Winning close games against conference opponents is fun ... but blowouts can be equally as fun, too. Tonight, the Royals got a taste of the latter and made a clean sweep of the Saint Mary's Cardinals by defeating them 9-1 on the road one night after a thrilling 5-4 win at home.

The puck-in-the-net parade started at precisely 5:05 into the first period on a power play when Mason Swenson (So., Eagan, Minn.) scored with the help of Jon Crouse (Fr., Alexandria, Minn.) and Jack Paul (Fr., Minnetonka, Minn.). Just under seven minutes later, Jake Calleja (Fr., New Richmond, Wis.) scored his eighth goal of the season, again on a power play, with assists going to Corey Grandner (Fr., Champlin, Minn.) and Tom Menozzi (Jr., Lakeville, Minn.). At 13:37, Bethel struck again when Malcolm Richards (Fr., Yorktown, Va.) lit the lamp for his very first time as a college player, thanks to passes from Crouse and Josh Simi (Fr., Apple Valley, Minn.).

But wait, there's more. And oh yeah, this is still the first period.

Less than two minutes after Richards gave Bethel a 3-0 lead, Calleja struck again, helping the Royals take advantage of not one, not two, but three power play opportunities in the first period alone. Granted, they were given several chances. Saint Mary's players spent 22 minutes in the penalty box in the first period, which could be considered somewhat high when taking into account that there are only 20 minutes in a period. Grandner and Austin Hatch (So., Cloquet, Minn.) we credited with assists on Calleja's second goal of the game.

In the second period, the Cardinals tightened up their defense, somewhat, as it was a full 6:30 into the period until Bethel scored again. Jack Paul added to his conference-leading freshman point-scoring total by notching his seventh goal of the season, aided by Crouse and Christian Fogerty (Jr., Forest Lake, Minn.), again, on a power play. Paul put the biscuit in the basket again at 14:40 into the period with the help of Jake Kogler (So., Forest Lake, Minn.) and Fogerty to extend the Bethel lead out to six.

But wait, there's more. And oh yeah, this is still the second period.

Lukas Jorgensen (Jr., Little Falls, Minn.), who had just scored his first collegiate goal the night before, tallied his second career goal at 17:36, with assists going to Chaz Gerads (So., Blaine, Minn.) and Richards making the score 7-0 at the end of two periods of play.

Unfortunately, despite the glee he was no doubt deriving from watching his teammates create a puck dumpster at the other end of the ice, Aaron Damjanovich's (Sr., Remer, Minn.) shutout bid was taken away 42 seconds into the third period, and the Cardinals were on the scoreboard.

However, for the Cardinals one step forward, the Royals made them take two steps back by scoring twice more before the game was over. Simi and Richards connected to make the score 8-1 at 2:28 into the third period, and then Grandner and Menozzi teamed up to tack on one more for good measure at 13:54.

The Royals have scored six goals twice this season, but it's been more than three years since they've scored nine on anyone, let alone a MIAC opponent. St. Thomas was the last team to take a Bethel beating in the box score by such a number when the Royals won 9-3 on December 2, 2006 - the same year Bethel captured its first MIAC regular season and playoff championship titles.

Aside from the one Saint Mary's goal, the only other blemish on the night was a pair of game misconduct penalties to Steffen Hansen (Fr., Blaine, Minn.) and Simi, which accounted for 24 of Bethel's 34 third period penalty minutes. That's not to say that Saint Mary's didn't try to catch Bethel in that category either. The Cards committed an additional seven infractions for 22 minutes of penalty-box time in the third period as well, bringing their total to 52 minutes for the game. They, too, had two players receive game misconduct penalties. Fortunately for the Royals on this rough evening, they took advantage of five power play opportunities off of the ... wait for it ... 18 penalties committed by the Cardinals, which produced 11 power plays.

Bethel is now back in third place in the conference standings with a 6-4 MIAC record and an 8-11 overall mark. Meanwhile, the Cardinals drop to 1-15-1 overall and 1-7 in the conference with the loss. The Royals will return to action next Friday when they are scheduled to take on the St. Olaf Oles beginning at 7 p.m. at home at the Schwan's Super Rink.